Seven years ago, Mikhail Gorbachev took charge in the Kremlin and initiated a series of vast changes in the Soviet Union. Perestroika, Glasnost, and so on gave Soviet citizens a temporary vision of hope and prosperity. But the subsequent conservative reaction, economic difficulties, material shortages, and the threat of national disintegration have swept this vast and ancient land.

"Now we have nothing, except for freedom of thought," said a young university student on a street corner in Moscow, gazing at a long line of people in front of him.

This is also a turning point for Soviet Sinology. The young Sinologist Dr. Andrei Kouzmenko says, "After Gorbachev came into power, ideological manipulation nearly completely disappeared." You could say that Soviet reform has yet to show results--with the only exception being freedom of speech.

Here's a concrete example of exploding myths: In the past, even if a scholarly work had no relationship to contemporary politics, it was necessary to quote Marxist classics in the forward and conclusion and point out in what way Marxist-Leninist thought had been helpful to the writer's research. Alexei Voskrasensky, a 32-year-old researcher at the Institute of Far Eastern Studies of the Academy of Sciences (AOS) of the USSR, who wrote a work on the noted Han dynasty historian Ssu Ma Chien, sighed, "I really have no idea what the relationship between Ssu Ma Chien and Lenin is!"

Today, a time that Soviets describe as the "most free period of thought in the history of the USSR," young Sinologists already see the ideological framework as "the emperor's new clothes." They are turning toward independent exploration, determining their own direction. This is the greatest change in Soviet Sinology since early in this century.

As in Western Europe, Sinological research had begun in Russia as early as the 17th century. In the Imperial era, under the impetus of several important personages, research results were in no way inferior to the West. But in 1917, Lenin led the Communist Party in overthrowing the Czar, Marxist and Leninist thought were used to completely restructure the old society, and Soviet Sinology subsequently entered a completely different path from the West.

After the Communist Party took power, traditional Sinologists who had done research in Chinese philosophy, literature, and linguistics were accused of "feudal thinking," and repeatedly criticized. With the new prerequisite of "everything to serve policy," the direction of research was completely turned to contemporary Chinese politics, society, and economics, and especially Sino-Soviet relations.

In fact, after the October revolution, the Soviets, in order to prove the superiority of Communism, ambitiously thought to promote similar socialist revolutions across the globe. China, with its huge land mass and large population, and which at the time was facing warlordism and bullying by the great powers, and was wavering between tradition and westernization, was naturally an important object of Soviet wooing. Given this background, not only did many scholars with formal training throw themselves into research in current Chinese politics, economics, and society, many reporters, government officials, party cadres, and land reformers also became "impassioned" with China.

According to statistics, in the 30 years from 1917 to 1949, when mainland China fell under Communist control, nearly 200 volumes were published in the USSR about China's land reform, agricultural economics, labor movement, and so on. In 1930 the AOS established its Institute of Oriental Studies and issued numerous publications; countless articles related to China were published.

Nevertheless, this fad for researching China which was led by the Communist Party was in fact only concerned with the future of communism in China. The vast majority of "China specialists" were practitioners participating in Chinese affairs. They hoped to use the Russian communist experience and the Communist International Line to change China.

Looking back from today, the Sinologists of the time who were actively involved in practical affairs did not use a fully academic perspective to do research. The Soviet scholar Yuri Garushchyants says, for example, "They used their own set of theories to explain China, rather than understanding China from its actual situation." When they went to China, they discovered that it was still an agricultural society, had not yet become a capitalist society, and could not produce an independent workers' movement. This did not fit with the Marxist theory of the staged development from a staged development from a capitalist to a socialist society. As a result, they "trivialized" Chinese history to permit it to skip capitalism and to permit it to undertake the "socialist revolutionary move-ment," in order to fit their presuppositions and policies.

Chen Yung-fa, a research fellow at the Institute of Modern History at the Academia Sinica, notes that in this period Soviet Sinology was intertwined with the power struggle in the Communist Party. After Lenin died in 1924, Stalin and Trotsky proposed different visions of the future development of Soviet Russia. The two factions struggled, with each imposing its own theories on China in order to prove the correctness of its own line.

Bruce Elleman, a Ph.D. candidate in history at Columbia University, who is writing a dissertation on modern Sino-Soviet relations, states that, "In fact Chinese studies were just used as a tool of struggle."

The China studies that emerged from this murky situation had many contradictions and flaws in the analysis of the development of Chinese society.

No matter whether one talks about the works produced by Sinologists, Communist International activists, or reporters with experience in China, as far as today's scholars are concerned, "they have historical value, but no scholarly value." Chen Yung-fa notes that these all harped on the questions of "What is the nature of Chinese society? At what stage is the Chinese revolution?" Often they would first give an answer, and then tack on a theory. Under the weighty "cangue and lock" of ideology, "there were too many empty frameworks."

How do Soviet Sinologists themselves see this period of China studies? Yuri Garushchyants points out that 99% of the works of this period talk about China's "communist revolution." "Yet the historyof the Chinese Communist revolution is by no means the whole of modern Chinese history."

Karneev Andrei of the College of Asian and African Studies at Moscow State University, who researches Kuomintang economic policy, describes the China researchers of that era as "a group of people whose impact on China was large, but whose scholarly accomplishments were small."

On the other hand, scholars who took over from the imperial era studies of classical Sinology, after suffering severe criticism in the early period of Soviet rule, found their ranks even thinner when they again suffered from Stalin's purge of intellectuals in the 1930's. Many outstanding students of Alexeyev, considered the Soviet Union's greatest Sinologist, such as Nevsky, who was fluent in six or seven languages and once wrote a dictionary for the Tsao people of Taiwan, died in prison before reaching 40.

In the Leningrad branch of the Institute of Far Eastern Studies of the AOS, there is a 10-plus meter wall along a corridor, which is covered with biographies of Sinologists who were oppressed at that time. The number reaches into the teens. At that time, traditional Sinology was also imbued with politics. Yuri Garushchyants says for example that in researching Confucianism, Taoism, and other Chinese philosophies, one did not try to understand the content of the thought. Rather, one had to use the theory of class struggle. As a result, Confucius was said to represent the petty landlords, while Lao Tse was said to represent the interests of the propertyless masses. This led to the conclusion that there it opposition between Confucian and Taoist philosophies.

For the Soviet Union, the communist takeover of China in 1949 was a major event for communism. Sino-Soviet relations entered a "honeymoon period." Though it was no longer necessary for Soviet Sinology to serve the sole master of "the revolution," it was still not possible to "serve truth." This was because the Soviet party center, in order to avoid offending Communist China, issued an order to Sinologists: Everything must make Communist China look good!

"Nothing that Communist China did could be criticized. Nothing they said could be rebutted. Whoever they denounced, we also denounced," says Yuri Garushchyants who in 1958 was denied entry into mainland China for criticising Mao's "People"s Communes." After 1949, writings by Sinologists had to clear the party center before they could be published.

It was even more unthinkable to try to objectively study anything related to the Republic of China at this time. "You couldn't even mention the fact that when the Kuomintang was on the mainland, they abolished the unequal treaties with the great powers which permitted the return of the foreign concessions," says Yuri Garushchyants

Even worse, any scholars that Communist China criticized by name--whether they be in Taiwan, Hongkong, or the mainland--were on the list of people with whom it was prohibited to have contact. Professor M.V. Kryukov of the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the AOS, recalls that "not only was it impossible to explore several viewpoints which were worth discussing, even worse, their scholarly theories were banned outright in the Soviet Union. This was a loss for Soviet Sinology for which nothing can compensate."

The China Studies Center, which had the most Sinologists in the Soviet Union at that time, was closed because of the Chinese Communist accusation that, "That is an imperialist way of thinking; China has no parallel Soviet Studies Center." The Soviet Union rationalized this by raising the slogan that "To understand our friend China, it was enough to understand it from the works of Chinese." They turned to large scale translation of contemporary Chinese works and classics. A Soviet Sinologist laughs that credit must go the "honeymoon period" between the Chinese and Soviet communists for the fact that China's most famous classics have virtually all been translated into Russian. Following the waxing and waning of Sino-Soviet relations, Soviet Sinology also had dramatic changes.

In 1953, Khrushchev came to power and initiated the "thaw" policy. He argued that the socialist revolution should be promoted with peaceful means, which conflicted with the "uninterrupted class struggle" favored by Mao Tse-tung. During the early period of the rift, because Soviet Sinology had just gone through the uncritical honeymoon period, and China had long been an object of Soviet wooing, they didn't know quite how to respond and could only fall silent. Writing about China nearly disappeared and Sinological research fell silent.

It was only in 1966, with the beginning of the Cultural Revolution, and Mao's continued denunciations of Soviet communism, that the Soviet Union "woke up" and determined its stance, and promptly established the Institute for Far Eastern Studies in the AOS. It once again drew together Sinologists who concentrated their fire in a theoretical battle with the Chinese communists, beginning a "struggle of ideologies in the realm of scholarship" with Communist China.

Princeton University professor Gilbert Rozman notes in his book A Mirror for Socialism that after Sino-Soviet relations deteriorated, the new mission of Soviet Sinology became: Since the Soviet Union is pursuing the correct communist path, how is it that Chinese communism got on the wrong track? "Thereafter, everyone had to do research under this guiding principle."

At the same time, the Soviet Communist Party issued its guiding viewpoints at major party meetings and through the party media, consequently influencing Sinological research. At that time, the leading members of several major research institutions had official status, and controlled access to the media. For example, Soviet Academician Serguei Tikhvinski, who still maintains that MarxistLeninist thought is superior to other theories, is a representative figure of this era. Rozman notes, "This was a period of unrelaxed, top-down, total control over Sinologists."

On the outside, the direction of Soviet Sinological research was extremely clear. In the 1950's, whatever Communist China said, it was necessary for Soviet scholars to nod their heads and agree. In the 1960's, the winds suddenly changed, and whatever viewpoint Communist China put forth, it was necessary for Soviet scholars to criticize it, often even before seeing it firsthand.

But in the view of Rozman and other Western scholars, many of the points on which the Soviet Union criticized China at this time have a great similarity to many of the points on which western scholars criticize the Soviet Union. Yuri Garushchyants already 60, recalls that the Chinese and Soviet parties came from the same roots. At that time the center wanted Sinologists to criticize Communist China, but not touch on Soviet communism. "This was an extremely challenging task," he says with heavy sarcasm.

However, besides the mainstream of Soviet Sinology at that time, which "served politics," there were still a small number of Sinologists skirting the edges of tolerated parameters, avoiding ideological and immediate political questions, and analyzing social problems Like labor policy. They tried not taking for granted that the Soviet Union was the only correct position, and used Chinese thinking to understand China. They also consulted Western scholarly research methods, and even hinted at defects of Soviet communism in their critiques of Chinese communism. Rozman calls them the "reform group." One example is Professor Lev Deliusin, former director of the China Studies Office of the Institute of Oriental Studies. Because of his views he was prohibited from speaking in public.

Following changes in the global situation, Sino-Soviet relations took a turn for the better in the 1980's. In 1981 the younger Sinologists have had the chance to go to mainland China, and their Chinese is far better than that of the middle-aged generation who had not been able to travel to mainland China for 30 years.

Despite these improvements, Marxist-Leninist dogma continued to permeate scholarship. It was only after Gorbachev came to power and put forward his "new thinking" foreign policy, and thought and speech gradually became more pluralistic, that there was really a fresh start for Chinese studies. Andrei Kouzmenko, who studies Communist Chinese-Soviet relations, and who works at the Institute of the World Economy at the AOS (which has been regarded as a relatively liberal place), says that even "five or six years ago, speech in our institution was still guided in the main by the views of the authorities."

Somewhat more fortunate were traditional Sinological fields like literature, archaeology, and linguistics. The wounds of the Stalin era slowly healed in the Khrushchev era. In particular, the farther back in time the dynasty one researched, and the farther away from the present world, the fewer were the taboos. "If I released an article saying that there had been some new archaeological discoveries or theories in Taiwan or mainland China," says Professor Stanislaw Kuczera, a researcher on the China Studies Committee at the Institute of Oriental Studies, "it would not be a problem."

Only because of this happenstance are there many definitive figures in fields of Soviet Sinology with many works to their credit and who are highly recommended by Western Sinologists. For example, there are Sorokin, who studies drama, Ristin, a specialist in popular literature, the linguist Yachontov, and Menshenkov, a scholar of Tunhuang. M. V. Kryukov, a member of the Academia Europaea, who has written over twenty volumes on Chinese ethnology, is praised by Tu Cheng Sheng, a research fellow at the Institute of History and Philology of the Academia Sinica, as having rigorous thinking and objective theories. Tu plans to invite him to Taiwan to do research for a year.

In addition, the Soviet Union has also produced many talented translators. Because of writer Lu Hsun's leftist background, for a time Lu Hsun studies were quite popular in the USSR, so that the country founded its unique "Lu Hsun-ology."

Today, a number of Sinologists who study classic Sinology are still unwilling to be grouped together with those studying modern China. Young China specialists ridicule the institute of Far Eastern Studies, which had been set up during the Cultural revolution and has the most personnel for studying modern China, saying it has already completed its "historical mission." Peter Ivanov, chairman of the China Modern History Research section of the Institute of Oriental Studies, who wrote a letter in 1989 to Peking protesting the massacre of students in Tienanmen, agrees that the leaders of the Far East Institute are still very conservative, and still think there are no problems with Communist China.

For the older generation, it is hard to get rid of the long term structure of thinking; this is understandable. "Many truly believe in MarxismLeninism," says Yuri Garushchyants. Even if they are like the "old right," who had never accepted the theories in toto, they still cannot cast off the burden of their own limitations. "They have long lost their immunity to Marxist-Leninist and Bolshevik theories." Thus today when he sees the writings of young scholars which are courageously critical and open in thinking, he is often startled and apprehensive.

The younger generation, whose thought has been liberated, is by no means without its own set of problems. "Our biggest problem now is not thought," says Ivanov, who has been unable to find research students for two years. With the worsening economic situation and inroads of market thinking, China studies is left somewhat out in the cold.

Today, with the Soviets moving toward a free market economy, everyone hopes to earn more money. There are fewer and fewer willing to do Sinological research. "If you study modern China, you still might be able to find work in a unit like the Ministry of Foreign Affairs; but if you research Confucius, you can't even eat," says Ivanov. But compared to working in a cooperative enterprise, not even the Foreign Ministry means anything.

Karneev Andrei, of the College of Asian and African Studies, who researches the Kuomintang, earns less than 200 rubles per month. A graduate of the College of Asian and African Studies can make US$300-400 in a foreign company--that's about 10,000 rubles.

Economic pressure also limits the opportunities for Sinologists to go abroad to participate in conferences or meet foreign scholars. Dr. Kroll of the Leningrad of the Institute of Oriental Studies had to pass up a chance to participate in a conference on Han dynasty literature in Shanghai because the Institute could not afford the US$100 registration fee. Kuczera says that given the tight financial situation, if three Soviet Sinologists are invited to a conference abroad at the same time, probably only one can go, and even then usually only if the host provides the air ticket.

Because paper is as scarce as money, it is hard for their writings to appear, "because they are not best-sellers," says Andrei Voskresensky, who is now pondering the problem of when his Nineteenth Century Sino-Soviet Relations can get out into the public. The Tunhuang scholar Menshenkov's study of the Pai Yu Ching was held by the publisher for seven years before being printed.

In particular, because Sinological research institutes are all under official jurisdiction, even if people want to do scholarly research, the choices are not great. Those who want to go abroad must wait for the government to send them. It is not hard to imagine why the younger generation is so envious of the free academic environment, sufficient funding, and profusion of private academic research in American Sinology.

Thought and speech in the US are open, and all kinds of theories coexist. This makes a big impression on scholars of modern Chinese history, who have been relatively more restricted. "You can find every kind of color in the US," says Yuri Garushchyants, unlike the Soviet Union where in the past one could only use black and white.

But whatever one may say for envy, young people who snort at Marxist-Leninist thought do not necessarily believe that they should follow the West entirely. Karneev Andrei, who has read many Western works, believes that there are many inadequate areas in American research. The common problem is that "although the theories of some are quite interesting, they lack supporting data, and many theories are consequently weak." Because there are few resources in the USSR, there is no way to do broad, all-inclusive research of the US style. "Then we'll just have to go deeper into our own specialities," says Andrei, who has not lost his optimism.

For the older generation of Sinologists, the new problems don't add up to much compared to the previous confines on thought. "The younger generation is lucky," says the nearly 60-year-old Kuczera sadly, "When Gorbachev became president, it was already too late for me."

[Picture Caption]

(Above) During the Stalinist era Soviet Sinologists suffered severe repression both physically and spiritually. The photo shows a poster in the Leningrad branch of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, about the Sinologists who suffered at that time.

(Right) The greatest achievement of Soviet reform thus far is freedom of thought and of speech.

The Sinologist Alexeyev, who worked at the turn of the century, was called "Ah Han Lin" (Han Lin having been a great center of learning in China). Under his initiative, Soviet Sinology swept the West for a time.

Soviet Sinologists who have just gone through "liberation" of thought are now looking for a new path. The photo is of Moscow.

The library of the Institute of Far Eastern Studies has more than 180,000 volumes related to modern China.

After the implementation of glamost, the market mudset has penetrated the Soviet Union, and the people are very interested in Western material goods.

The Soviet Academician Serguei Tikhvinski has many works on China to his credit.

The Sinologist Lev Deliusin, tagged by Princeton University professor Gilbert Rozman as one of the "reform group," was once prohibited from issuing public statements.

Today there are many highly respected figures in the Soviet Union in the fields of traditional Sinology. The photo is of M.V. Kryukov, an ethnologist and member of the Academia Europea.

The new generation of Sinologists are striving to escape ideological control. The photo is of the young Sinologist Karneev Andrei, who researches Kuomintang economic policy, participating in the Russian Federation presidential election in June of this year.

Having passed through Stalinism, Chinese and Soviet Communist friendship, and deterioration in Sino-Soviet relations, the Sinologist Yuri Garushchyants describes the vicissitudes of modern China research in the USSR.

The Leningrad branch of the Institute of Oriental Studies mainly focuses on classic Sinology.

（Right） The greatest achievement of Soviet reform thus far is freedom of thought and of speech.

The Sinologist Alexeyev, who worked at the turn of the century, was called "Ah Han Lin" （Han Lin having been a great center of learning in China）. Under his initiative, Soviet Sinology swept the West for a time.

Soviet Sinologists who have just gone through "liberation" of thought are now looking for a new path. The photo is of Moscow.

The library of the Institute of Far Eastern Studies has more than 180,000 volumes related to modern China.

After the implementation of glamost, the market mudset has penetrated the Soviet Union, and the people are very interested in Western material goods.

The Soviet Academician Serguei Tikhvinski has many works on China to his credit.

The Sinologist Lev Deliusin, tagged by Princeton University professor Gilbert Rozman as one of the "reform group," was once prohibited from issuing public statements.

Today there are many highly respected figures in the Soviet Union in the fields of traditional Sinology. The photo is of M.V. Kryukov, an ethnologist and member of the Academia Europea.

The new generation of Sinologists are striving to escape ideological control. The photo is of the young Sinologist Karneev Andrei, who researches Kuomintang economic policy, participating in the Russian Federation presidential election in June of this year.

Having passed through Stalinism, Chinese and Soviet Communist friendship, and deterioration in Sino-Soviet relations, the Sinologist Yuri Garushchyants describes the vicissitudes of modern China research in the USSR.

The Leningrad branch of the Institute of Oriental Studies mainly focuses on classic Sinology.